Creative Teaching 41halaman

The International Journal of Organizational Innovation - Volume 3, Number 4, Spring 2011

5

"2010 Outstanding Paper" The International Conference of Organizational Innovation

Bangkok, Thailand, August, 2010

CREATIVE TEACHING AND EFFECTIVE TEACHING IN HIGHER EDUCATION

Fernando Cardoso de Sousa Portuguese Association of Creativity and Innovation (APGICO)

[email protected]

Abstract

Students’ and lecturers’ perceptions of own effectiveness and creativity as teachers are compared, using a survey questionnaire with a sample of 854 students and 245 lecturers of a higher education institution, together with interviews and class observations of lecturers who were selected as examples of creative teaching. Results indicate that students concentrate more than faculty on creativity when imagining how they would perform as teachers; when effectiveness is considered, the opposite applies. In addition, the lecturers selected as creative score similar to students, as to the perception of their own creativity, and to their peers, as to effectiveness. Teaching creatively is seen by its agents as the search for doing things better, and if the communication process is successful, that attempt is perceived by the students as creative. This research demonstrates that creativity lies not in the teacher, nor in the student, but in the interaction between the two; and also suggests that it seems more important to understand what is involved in the construction of the role of teacher, and in the communication process with the students, rather than exploring creative ways to present the subject matter to students. Keywords: Creative Teaching, Effective Teaching, Creativity, Kelly’s Grids, Symbolic Interaction Theory, Role Theory


6

Introduction

Great teachers will have to live with the fate of being fired, discredited, isolated or their funds

being withdrawn.

Paul Torrance, Why Fly? (1995, p. 113) Paul Torrance’s words have made me wonder why it is not precisely the opposite that

happens, and whether it will always be like this. We tend to think that what happened to great

teachers in the past would not fit in with today’s western civilisation and its openness to

creativity and innovation. Even admitting that schools, as in any other complex organisation,

would tend to reject teachers who might unbalance the system by bringing in too many

innovations, could a creative teacher be better accepted at least by the student population?

Trying to answer this and other questions requires a deep understanding of what is meant

by creativity and creative teaching, how it fits in with the role and tendencies of today’s

university; and how one constructs and performs the role of a teacher, in such a way that it meets

the requirements of the student, as well as the requirements of peers and superiors. This

understanding can contribute to an easier acceptance of the truly creative teacher by a rather

conservative organisation such as the school, and to help the creative teacher to balance more

effectively the requirements of students and peers.

This article is therefore dedicated to teachers who would like to pursue creative

approaches to teaching, and to be seen as effective by both students and staff. Let us begin by

trying to understand the concept of creativity.

The Concept of Creativity

One of the first difficulties is that not everyone interprets and values creativity the same

way. In fact, as Woodman & Schoenfeld (1990) recall, the term creativity can be seen either as a


7

social concept, expressed by people’s implicit theories, or as a theoretical construct, developed

by researchers in the field.

Considering the theoretical definitions, and after carefully analysing the propositions

evidenced by Kasof (1995), it is possible to conclude that the construct of creativity was (and

still is) used in the scientific literature to designate something perceived by others. Amabile

(1983) states that a product or response is creative to the extent that appropriate observers

independently agree it is creative. ...and it can also be regarded as the process by which

something so judged is produced. Stein (1953; 1984; 1994) maintains that creativity is a process

that results in novelty which is accepted as useful, tenable, or satisfying by a significant group of

others at some point in time. These examples illustrate what can only be designated as creativity,

after a successful communication process.

As the product of that communication process, creativity appears connected to what is

perceived as new and useful by someone other than its originator, or as the putting to use of an

idea (Kanter, 1983; West & Farr, 1990), in the domains of production, adoption, implementation,

diffusion, or commercialisation of creations (Kaufmann, 1993; Rogers, 1983; Spence, 1994). In

these cases, creativity is seen as innovation.

Others, like Baer (1997), Runco (1998), Kokot & Colman (1997) see creativity as a

personal construct. Baer (1997), for example, considers creativity to be anything that someone

does in a way that is original to the creator and that is appropriate to the purpose or goal of the

creator. Recognising creativity as a personal concept, used by people to describe their acts at

any moment, is in a sense using implicit theories of creativity. It lies in how each individual

organises and incorporates the perception of reality in his or her own self. Striving for mastery

and perfection, the expression of one’s own individuality and sharing with others, become


8

essential parts of the core construct of creativity, which may, then, encompass a wider array of

activities, products, processes and performances.

Creativity seems then to acquire its full meaning only after a successful process of

communication between the creator (or the product) and the judges or audience, even though its

essence lies in the communication between the creator and the product. Innovation seems to be

more appropriate to designate the resulting attribution made by the audience apropos the product.

As a consequence, creativity can only be measured through socio-cultural judgements,

and is therefore context-dependent. Quoting Csikszentmihalyi (1991), creativity is located in

neither the creator nor the creative product but rather in the interaction between the creator and

the field’s gatekeeper who selectively retains or rejects original products.

This way, the theoretical construct of creativity relies on people’s implicit theories of

creativity, i.e. in the ways they consider a specific product, person or process as representative of

their conceptions of creativity.

Concepts and Definitions of Creative Teaching

If it is almost impossible to reach agreement as to what “good” or “effective” teaching

means, as authors tend to diverge between both poles - traditional and progressive, or teacher-

centered and student-centered -, comparing the worst of one against the best of the other, mixing

personality traits, teacher behaviors and styles, teaching methods and techniques, and classroom

management tips. A more precise construction is then necessary, to provide for common

understanding, and one possibility may be to use the concept of “creative teaching”.

One distinction that must be made is between the creative person who happens to be a

teacher, and the act of teaching in a creative way. A painter, for example, may be a highly

creative artist, but not necessarily a creative teacher, although he may exercise both professions.


9

Even the teacher who inspires students by a personal example of creativity may not be the person

this text is dealing with. As Torrance (1962) mentions, the type of teacher who manipulates

students through creative self-expression does not lead to their significant development. In fact,

as Stein (1994, pg. 175) relates, few differences were found in students’ creativity whether they

had creative or uncreative teachers, while “those who were the pupils of teachers skilled in good

relationships were more likely to be better off in using what they learned.”

As happens with the concept of creativity, people tend to have their own images of the

meaning of creative teaching, which do not necessarily coincide with the specialized literature.

Fryer and Collings (1990; 1991), for example, reported that, in a study with more than 1,000

British teachers, from various educational levels, the vast majority tended to view creativity as

“divergent thinking”, and only a tenth recognized that it also involved convergent thinking; Fryer

(1996) also points out that people tend to see creativity as arts related, not science related, and

that if the respondents to the questionnaire had been provided with a definition of creativity, “the

differences in the way the various groups of teachers perceive creativity would not have become

apparent.” (p. 34).

When looking in the literature for definitions of creative teaching, the majority of the

authors who write about it avoid providing such a definition, preferring to list series of

behaviors, approaches or strategies that characterize creative teaching. Paul Torrance, one of the

main researchers in this field, never provided such a definition, but only of creative learning,

which is not the same as creative teaching.

It is possible, though, when looking at the existent literature, to find examples connected

with different approaches: one is the use of creative methods and techniques, as in the definition

proposed by Mayer (1989) “creative teaching refers to instructional techniques that are intended


10

to help the students learn new material in ways that will enable them to transfer what they

learned to new problems” (p. 205); another is the development of students’ cognitive abilities, as

in Whitman’s (1994) definition, “teaching students to use strategies for representing and

processing new information in ways that lead to problem solving transfer” (p. 5), or Osborn’s

(1992), “the type of teaching which causes students to think as they learn” (p. 51); and one

directed to relational and emotional aspects, as in the example of Slabbert (1994), “creative

teaching is to be sensitive to the individual’s conception of himself and his role in the classroom”

(p. 23); still another related to classroom environment, as in the definition proposed by Bozik

(1990), “is to make classes contemporary and stimulant; innovation, variety and challenge must

be apparent”; or the classical teacher-centered view of creative teaching as “inventive

flexibility”, that is, to “be able to identify needs clearly, read a situation, preparedness to take

risks and capability in monitoring and evaluating events”.

Even though expressed in different ways, they complement each other, so that some of

them seem more directed to communication (relational and emotional aspects) with the students,

or to the development of their cognitive abilities, while others stress the innovative aspects

brought by the teacher, either by the use of new methods and techniques, or by managing the

classroom environment. Even though both are highly connected, we can perhaps describe the

former approaches (communicational; relationship aspects) as being more student-centered, and

the latter (innovative; task centered) aimed mainly at the teacher.

If we look at the first approach - the use of creative teaching techniques - the literature

provides a vast amount of examples of using specific materials, classroom arrangements, or

programs, designed to increase the students’ cognitive abilities, as well as whole-person

development, described further in this text in a model from Treffinger (1986). As Arnold (1992)


11

enumerates, a series of creative teaching techniques, derived from CPS (Creative Problem

Solving) methods, have proved significant in changing the way teachers teach, as earlier

discussed. Although this is probably the most popular association that people make with creative

teaching - the use of specific techniques - they are just a means to provide for what is stated in

the remaining definitions - cognitive and affective aspects in learning.

The definitions are then complementary, and if they are, their merging originates so

inclusive a view that it has little value for providing an understanding of what is involved in

creative teaching, as a specific kind of teaching.

The Movement Towards Creativity in Education

The movement towards creativity in education, born of the initial post-World War focus

on gifted and talented children, was led by the United States; Stein (1986) enumerates people

such as Paul Torrance, J. P. Guilford, Wallach and Kogan, Getzels and Jackson, Renzulli,

Treffinger, and others. This movement has spread to other countries and has been adopted at

further educational levels, in a sort of opposition to the so called traditional style, mainly around

the development in the students of Guilford’s original divergent functions: fluency, flexibility,

originality and elaboration. As creativity theory evolved beyond divergent thinking techniques,

so did its applications to education, which began to include all possible improvements of an

education for the future, in opposition to the traditional approach, as in the Isaksen and Parnes’

(1992, p. 427) comparison list, as follows in Figure 1.

As may be seen in this comparison, similar to the distinction that Entwistle & Marton

(1989) make between surface learning and deep learning, the creative approach leads teaching

and learning to a much broader perspective, “defeating” completely the traditional approach.

Nevertheless it fails to provide the latter with a sense of purpose, or even to consider it,


12

sometimes, as a necessary step to arriving at further stages of development. As Berger &

Luckman (1976) explain, if the traditional approach may be blamed for its apparent ideology

(ideas serving as weapons for social interests), the creative one is probably too utopian (context-

free knowledge, divorced from reality), and the best way lies probably in the middle, as Cropley

(1992) advises.

As presented, creative teaching seems to have been recollecting elements from teaching

movements that were trying to react against poor teaching practice. It may then be more easy to

characterize it by what it is not, rather by what it is.

The comprehensive Treffinger (1980) creative learning model, here reproduced in Figure

2, also aims at higher levels of developmental goals than did the original divergent thinking and

simple creative personality characteristics (Level I); it thus becomes liable to create a feeling of

frustration in a teacher who does not feel able to get even part of it from the students.

Nevertheless, as mentioned earlier, what is shown in the model is aimed at learning, not

teaching; it only becomes much more demanding upon the teacher, if one assumes that all of the

learning is the teacher’s responsibility, which is not the case, especially in higher education.

This danger of frustration in someone who tries to pursue creative teaching may also be

expressed in the personal qualities approach to teaching, as described in the following section.

The Creative Teacher’s Characteristics, Behaviors and Classroom Activities

Torrance and Safter (1990) start the list of a creative teacher’s characteristics with

“performs miracles” and “inspires the students”, which is by no means within the reach of the

vast majority of teachers. Referring to personality traits, Torrance (1962; 1968) mentions,

“capacity to form good relationships with their creative students”, “hard workers”,

“nonconforming”, “childish at times”, “does not work for status and power”, “likes to be


13

Traditional” assumptions Creative assumptions

1. The student goes to school to acquire knowledge which has existed for a long time and is handed down on authority. 2. Subject matter taken on authority is educative in itself. 3. The best way to set out subject matter is in unassociated fragments or parcels.

1. The student goes to school to acquire skills which enable him/her to continue learning to deal with unknown/unpredicted events and challenges. Part of these skills involves the ability to acquire data (knowledge) necessary for the task in hand. 2. Subject matter provides the raw material for learning but has value only when put to use in relevant and meaningful ways. 3. The best way to attain knowledge is through active, experiential learning in a setting meaningful to the individual.

4. A fragment or parcel of subject matter is the same to the learner as to the teacher. 5. Education is supplementary to and preparatory to life, not life itself. 6. Since education is not present living, it has no social aspects.

4. What is relevant, meaningful and sensible to the learner varies according to each individual’s background, experience, characteristics and needs. 5. Education involves growth, and is, therefore, a component of living. 6. Personally meaningful learning involves interaction and effective communication with others.

7. The teacher can and should furnish the purpose needed for the acquiring of knowledge. 8. Working on tasks devoid of purpose or interests is good discipline. 9. The answer to the problem is more important than the process.

7. The learner’s needs and involvement provide the initial purpose for creative learning. 8. It is important to involve the learner in choosing tasks which are interesting and have relevance for the learner, or to find ways of making given tasks interesting or purposeful to the learner. 9. While solution to problems may have immediate importance, learning a problem-solving process has great long-range importance.


14

10. It is more important to measure what has been learned than it is to learn.

10. It is both possible and important to document the impact (effect) and value of creative learning.”

Figure 1. Comparison between “traditional” and “creative” approaches to teaching (Isaksen and Parnes,1992, p. 427)

Cognitive Independent inquiry Self-direction Resource management Product development “The practicing professional”

Level III

Involvement in

Real Challenges

Affective Internalization of values Commitment to productive living Toward self-actualization

Cognitive Application Analysis Synthesis Evaluation Methodological research and skills Transformations Metaphor and analogy

Level II

Complex

Thinking and

Feeling Processes

Affective Awareness development Open to complex feelings Relaxation, growth Values development Psychological safety in creating Fantasy, imagery

Cognitive Fluency Flexibility Originality Elaboration Cognition and memory

Level I

Divergent

Functions

Affective Curiosity Willingness to respond Openness to experience Risk taking Problem sensitivity Tolerance of ambiguity Self-confidence

Figure 2. Treffinger’s (1980) comprehensive creative learning model

appreciated”, “adventurous”, “unpredictable”; and Cropley (1992) enumerates “inclined to be

flexible and willing to ‘get off the beaten track’”, “resourceful in introducing new materials and


15

in finding ways to present knowledge to students”, “capable of enjoying good relations with all

of their students but inclined to have particularly good relations with highly divergent ones”,

“likely to be non-conforming and even critical and fault finding in their relationship with their

colleagues”, “self-critical and frequently dissatisfied with themselves and the system in which

they are operating”.

As to behaviors, Walberg (1991) mentions “encourages students to be independent”,

“acts as a role model”, “assists students outside the class”, “accepts students as equals”, “rewards

directly the student’s creativity or work”, “has an individualized approach”, and also enumerates

the characteristics of those who do not “facilitate” creativity in the students: “rejects creative

ideas from students”, “hypercritical”, “sarcastic”, “non-enthusiastic”, “insecure”, “dogmatic”,

“non-actualized”, “non-available”. Alencar (1994), consider “cultivating the interest in

discoveries and new knowledge”, “stimulating the students’ initiative, self-confidence, new

ideas, curiosity, independence and critical ability”, “leading the student to understand divergent

perceptions of a problem, allowing him to disagree with the teacher’s points of view”,

“diversifying the teaching methodologies”, “treating students as valuable individuals”,

“contacting them outside the classroom”; also “encouraging students to do things they have

never done before”, “to write their own stories or poems”, “to protect creativity from criticism

and ridicule”. Torrance (1997), in his test Opinions on creative learning and teaching, develops

50 items like “teachers should at times encourage pupils to think of wild ideas”, “the presence of

a group stimulates many pupils to think of original ideas”, “it facilitates important learning for

pupils to try to imagine or visualize things they cannot actually see”;

Instead of personality characteristics or teaching behaviors, and shifting the focus from

the teacher to the student, we find all sorts of lists that try to select the most appropriate


16

classroom strategies and environments designed to promote creative learning. Torrance (1990),

enumerates “confrontation with ambiguities and uncertainties”, “awareness of a problem”,

“building onto existing knowledge”, “concern about problems”, “stimulating curiosity and

wanting to know”, “familiar made strange or strange made familiar by analogy”, “freedom from

inhibiting sets”, “looking at the same material from different viewpoints”, “ask provocative

questions”, “predictions from limited information”, “purposefulness of activity made clear”,

“structured only enough to give clues and directions”, “creative personality characteristics

encouraged”, “visualization encouraged”, “time for incubation”, “the importance of praise and

creative evaluation”. The same author, in his test What makes a college of education creative?,

adds 146 items like “there are many opportunities for the ‘on-the-scene’ activities where the

action is rather than a ‘classroom bound’ expectation”, “original research is encouraged

throughout the undergraduate years”, “students feel free to ask questions, express ideas, etc.”,

“there is time for the pursuit of creative achievements both in classrooms and out of class”,

“there is a program of lectures and seminars which brings to the campus each year 10 to 15 of

the greatest thinkers in the world”, “students participate in the planning of courses regarding

goals, learning activities, methods of evaluation, etc.”, “course requirements make creative

thinking necessary”, “there are special rewards and recognition for creative achievement for both

faculty and students”, “instructors are respectful of the ideas of students”, “students take some

work in a creative field such as music, art, writing, movement, drama, invention, etc.”,

“individual differences are welcomed and used”.

The listings of personality characteristics, behaviours, and activities designed to promote

creative learning are considerable, and so more doubts arise as to what really makes the

difference between creative teaching and any other kind of effective teaching.


17

Creative Teaching Techniques

When searching for techniques, we can find possibilities that go beyond the “traditional

creative” divergent thinking and problem solving techniques, but that belong to other fields of

research besides creative teaching, as in the case of simulation and games (Greenblat, 1988),

experiential learning (Pfeiffer & Jones, 1974), to name just two. If we search for other sources of

literature, which came out of cognitive psychology and cognitive science, many more techniques

can be obtained, as in the teaching of problem solving; and the teaching of thinking - creative

and critical.

Still another source of confusion in understanding what creative teaching arises when

authors in the field of creative teaching write about techniques outside divergent thinking and

problem solving ones. Torrance, Murdock & Fletcher (1966), for example, in a text about the

use of role playing in education, give notice of nine possibilities (Soliloquy, Double Technique,

Audience Techniques, Multi Double Techniques, Mirror Techniques, Role Reversal Techniques,

Magic Shop and Magic Net techniques, Future Projection and Future Soliloquy Techniques,

Future Double Techniques) within role playing alone, apparently moving away from the initial

divergent thinking programs, also listed by Torrance (1995). It happens frequently, also, that

authors deal with concepts taken out of other movements in teaching, as Treffinger, Isaksen, &

Firestien (1983) warn (i.e. experiential curricula, democratic instruction, humanistic and

affective education, futures) and, as they are connected with the creative teaching movement,

there is the possibility that people associate these concepts with creative teaching just because

the author is related to research in creativity.

The frontier between creative teaching constructs and techniques and other kinds of

constructs and techniques becomes more and more blurred, as the sciences of education develop.


18

These listings of personal characteristics, teaching behaviors, classroom strategies, and

teaching techniques lead us to conclude that there exist various possible theoretical constructs of

creative teaching, depending on the approaches analyzed (characteristics, behaviors, techniques,

environments), and also that the danger of falling into the trap of the ideal teacher still persists,

as the literature tends to include a vast array of material dealing with effectiveness in teaching.

The conception of creative teaching becomes very broad then, and tends to include all that may

be put under the umbrella of effective teaching, leading people to infer that creative teaching, as

seen in the literature, is the same as effective teaching; and this effectiveness demands much

more than is in fact possible.

The danger lies then in making a direct analogy between less-creative teaching and

ineffective teaching, which may not be true. In fact effectiveness may be a characteristic of

creative teaching, and less-creative teaching may also be effective, depending on the

circumstances.

Creative Teaching as a Self-Attributed Concept

In the end, as Spector (1983) points out, a good teacher is simply one who has continued

to grow; one who tries to improve in the job, which is the equivalent to creative behavior, as seen

through the eyes of the individual, in such a specific way that, as Trow (1997) explains, not even

originality is important, but only doing the job well and treating the students respectfully. Doing

the job well may be represented by thinking through the key ideas in the text or lesson and

identifying the alternative ways of presenting them to students. Seen as self-perception,

creativity is directed towards improvement, or perfection (the goal of life, as explained by

Sanford, 1998), and it acquires the meaning of creativity, effectiveness, or excellence according

to those who evaluate the action of the individual, namely the students and the faculty.


19

Again, creativity appears as a hetero-attributed concept, and it may even be possible, as Fryer

(1994) concludes, that teachers do not recognize themselves as creative, but only with possessing

social attributes and willingness to work hard. Perceptions of creativity, and of effectiveness, are

dependent upon the observer, and hetero-attributions of creativity are expected to occur among

those who are sensitive to the communicational processes or the innovative products originated

by the individual in question. If the student feels that, partially as a result of teaching, he or she

has produced something creative, or has developed in that direction, then some of the reasons

may be attributed to the teacher.

Besides considering the individual creative, the observers may or may not regard that

individual as effective. And so, depending on the observer, it is likely that creative teaching is

included in effective teaching, but the opposite may also be the case, where creative teaching is

placed outside the effective teaching concept. Barros, Neto & Barros (1992), for example, in a

study with 308 teachers, found they put creativity in fifth place, after scientific competence, fine

method, authority, and freedom. It may even be possible, as Dawson, D’Andrea, Affinito, &

Westby (1999) observe, that teachers have particular views of creativity, different from

traditional ones; they found that teachers value good citizenship characteristics in their students

(e.g., “is sincere”, “is good natured”), besides the traditional ones (e.g., “is individualistic”).

Hetero-Perceptions of Creative and Effective Teaching

From the previous considerations we reached the conclusion that creative teaching did

not represent a kind of teaching easily identifiable in the present literature, because the use of

teaching techniques, directed to the development of the students’ thinking abilities, had gone far

beyond divergent- thinking techniques; and, as the other teaching techniques were not born out

of creative teaching theory, and also contribute to the development of thinking abilities, the


20

frontier between creative and non-creative techniques had become blurred. Not even the only

thing that seemed to remain inviolate - the fact that creative teaching is student-centered and

aims at maximizing the learning potential - can be assured, because it is dependent upon the

observer and the way a person values creativity in teaching.

Creative teaching methodology does not even intend to present a completely new

perspective, as it tends to search for its meaning in classical education, which Boone (1987)

considers to be directed to invention and discovery; “back to basics”, as Craft (1999) concludes.

Getting back to where we started, as in the conception of Spector (1983), creative

teaching is probably just to provide opportunities for the learners to improve their creativity,

which means the building of a unique perception of something more, shareable with others. It is

then, mainly, remembering Stein’s (1994) and Torrance’s (1962) conceptions of creative

teaching, an emphasis on communication (relationship) between teachers and students, and so it

seems quite appropriate as a means to evaluate how these two protagonists differ in their

perceptions of teaching and learning.

Perception and Construction of the Teacher’s Role

Spelling out what it is in society that impacts particular aspects of the person, as well as

what it is in the person that makes a difference to particular aspects of society, and just how these

mutually determining processes take place, requires a theoretical framework to facilitate

movement from the level of social structure to the level of the person and vice-versa; it also

requires explanatory principles articulating the two levels that reflect the inherent complexity of

both. This is the purpose of symbolic interaction theory and role theory.

As Stryker & Statham (1985) describe, role theory was developed through Social

Anthropology and German Sociology, while social interaction theory appeared as the study of


21

the behaviour of people playing out roles shaped through evolutionary adaptation. Both theories

depend on the concept of “role”, which articulates social structure as conceptualised around the

way an individual becomes incorporated into organised patterns of interaction, conducted in

terms of meanings persons develop in the course of their conduct - “symbols”. In fact, people

learn to hold expectations of themselves and others according to the positions they occupy in the

social structure, and as social systems tend to equilibrium and harmony between the parts, the

individual is led to conform to collective habits, and to act according to other people’s

expectations, which one becomes aware of through the process of communication. If a person

wants to be accepted within a certain group, that person needs to learn to be “sympathetic” to the

group, which means to learn to anticipate the possible reactions of others to one’s own

behaviour.

The individual develops specific ways to respond to other people’s expectations, creating

his own “self” between the control made by the attitudes of others and his spontaneous

behaviours, by means of putting himself in the place of the other, and responding as the other

would do - role-taking - and by anticipating the consequences of his own behaviour - role-

making. As Munné (1989) explains, through the former the individual anticipates the other’s

behaviour, which allows that individual to respond as the other would do; as to the latter it

corresponds to the role which is really performed, and not to what the individual is expected to

perform - prescribed role.

Roles are social in the specific sense that it is not possible to talk sensibly about a

position (any recognised category of people) without at least implicit references to other

positions. As in the words of Stryker & Statham (1985), “to use the term ‘role’ it is necessary to

refer to interaction: there can be no ‘teacher’ without ‘pupils’, no ‘rebel’ without an


22

‘establishment’. Any position assumes a counter position; any role assumes a counter-role.” (p.

323). Through thinking, the person imagines being another, and tries to devise what kind of

behaviours appear as most suitable, in a sort of anticipatory socialisation; this may bring conflict

between the self-concept and the expectations of others, if the fit is not satisfactory. In the case

of a teacher, for example, who fails to have his or her own role validated by the students, this

will make it difficult for the person to maintain a sense of self that depends on that role; the

response may be either to try to change, keeping the students as the “significant other”, or to

create another self to respond to expectations of another target population, like peers or

superiors.

According to Gabarro (1987), the construction of one’s own role may develop through

several processes, like socialisation, role conflict, structure of role relationships and role

transitions, all of which may take place in a “bargaining“ between people. The more people have

their preferences and needs met in role relationships, the more satisfied they are in those

relationships; and the more others share that person’s values, orientations and preferences, the

more readily role arrangements can be devised that meet the needs of those involved.

If role partners can agree on preferred role arrangements, their satisfaction is likely to be

high; this consensus is not automatic but achieved, and aspects like organisational distance and

authority reduce the probability of role bargaining between people situated at different levels of

the hierarchy. This process of bargaining is highly emotional, because it involves the person’s

imagination of others’ feelings, when putting oneself in the place of the other, and taking that

person’s perspective. Then, feelings like embarrassment, shame, or guilt, enter social control

processes and produce the “socialisation of affect”, that is, the organisation of emotional

expressions according to the person and the situation, in order to maintain established feelings.


23

The interesting view of Maslow (1968) contemplates a self-development transcending

role definitions and allowing for self-actualisation, as a fundamental of human existence: the

human capacity for autonomy from social circumstance. Self-control is an outgrowth of social

control, and dependence on multiple others makes possible independence from the expectations

of any given other(s), freeing the person to an important degree and making the choice possible.

Even in a situation of maximal coercion, persons creatively seek and find means to assert their

individuality, and so creativity and individuality may be seen as the product of the same social

processes that produce constraint and conformity, as the search for individuality may lead the

person to break with specific rights and duties, and thus, as Hinde (1997) explains, to become

subjected to social sanctions.

To Petkus (1966), the construction of a creative role identity leads the individual to act in

the way others will regard him or her as creative; a role-performance identity of “creative

teacher”, for example, would imply such behaviours as using non-traditional texts, employing

innovative class projects, etc. There is an inexorable synergy between role support from others

and self role support, when both are significantly present; however, the individual may reject

immediate role support if he or she is convinced that future generations, or other kind of

audiences, will provide such support. Therefore, the support may either be real or imagined, but

it needs to exist in order to feed the creative role.

Again, according to Stryker & Statham (1985), structural role theorists assume that

institutionalised role expectations (e.g. mother and child, employer and employee, teacher and

student) are the major constraint on a person’s behaviours and the internalisation of those role

expectations proceeds almost automatically in the course of the socialisation process. Harrin

(1993), for example, stresses the fact that the teachers’ initial professional development is


24

strongly influenced by images of previous teachers, which lead to immature and inflexible

patterns of behaviour.

Let us see, then, how these concepts may be supported by empirical investigation,

describing a study made by Sousa (1999).

Research

The subjects were 854 students and 245 teachers of undergraduate courses, in the seven

polytechnic Schools of the Instituto Politécnico de Lisboa (IPL) [Lisbon Polytechnic Institute].

The IPL is made up of semi-independent, geographically separated Schools of Music, Drama and

Cinema, Dance, Teacher Training (student teachers), Media Studies, Accountancy and

Administration, and Engineering, representing a population of 8 068 students and 812 teachers.

A 16-item, two-factor structure (task/effectiveness; relation/creativity), 5-point Likert-

type questionnaire, built using Kelly’s grid procedures (Kelly, 1963), was used to collect

quantitative data.

The instrument resulted from a series of transformations of an initial one with 56 opposite

constructs (112 behavioural descriptions), related to creative/non-creative teaching behaviours,

that were compared against theoretical descriptions to see if any important behaviour had been

left out of the four general categories considered (1 - scientific and pedagogic, 2 - ethics and

relationship, 3 - student evaluation, and 4 - personal characteristics). Each construct was rated

in four elements: The creative teacher; The non creative teacher; As I think I would be as a

teacher (students’ questionnaire), or As I think I am as a teacher (teachers’ questionnaire); and

How I would like to be as a teacher.

From the validation studies described by Sousa (1999), it was possible to conclude of the

instrument’s good construct validity (e.g. ability to discriminate among groups; convergence in


25

varimax rotation of factors), as well as reliability (internal consistency and temporal stability

above .75, in each factor). It also demonstrated good construct-related validity against three

known instruments: two of them proposed by Jesuino (1987): the Leader Behaviour Description

Questionnaire - Form XII (LBDQ), and the SYMLOG (Systematic Multiple Level Observation of

Groups); and one concerning the evaluation of creative teaching in higher education - Eunice

Alencar’s Questionnaire (Alencar, 1994).

In every School each faculty member received a questionnaire together with a letter

explaining its content and purpose. About 27% of the faculty (245) returned the questionnaire

correctly filled in. As to the students, the questionnaires were administered either by teachers

who volunteered to do so, at the end or in the beginning of their classes, or by members of the

students’ union. Using this procedure, it was possible to obtain 854 questionnaires correctly

filled in, thus representing almost 11% of the student population. The questionnaires obtained

allowed for representative samples in each school, below the .05 confidence interval.

Meanwhile, each students’ union was approached in order to draw up a list of teachers

considered creative as teachers, about which it was possible to obtain a consensus among the

students who were present at the meeting. No definition of creativity or creative teaching was

provided, nor a specific number of teachers demanded, and the lists were obtained after meetings

with students of each course and year, so that all possible teachers could be taken into

consideration.

From a total of 62 (out of 812) teachers selected by the students as examples of creative

teaching, 23 were interviewed. The interview questions coincided with the questionnaire, and

were: Why do you think you were chosen as creative by the students?, How do you characterise a

creative teacher?, And a non-creative one?, How do you see yourself as a lecturer?, and How


26

would you like to be, as a lecturer?. After each interview, the performance in class of the

interviewee was subjected to observation, and any event, act or interaction which could fit into

the scope of the investigation registered. From these 23 interviews, six were submitted to a

correspondence analysis, as well as six interviews to teachers not selected as examples of

creativity, taken at random.

Results

Recalling that each item could be rated from 1 to 5, results showed the agreement of the

subjects with the construction of the idea of creative and of effective teaching, since every item’s

mean score was below 3.00 (the closer the score was to 1.00, the closer it was to creativity or to

effectiveness in teaching). Nevertheless, the mean scores that characterised the ideal image of

the creative teacher, and that of the effective teacher, were not as close to the absolute creative

and effective score (1.00) as expected. The widest differences between item means occurred in

items describing behaviours more dependent on outside constraints (e.g. lack of time, too many

students, poor facilities, poor materials) than on teacher’s abilities.

Given the fact that it was necessary to appreciate the fit of the factor structure to each

population (teachers and students) separately, a confirmation of the two-factor model was drawn

up, using task (effectiveness) and relationship (creativity) subscales with the respective pool of

items. The results of the confirmatory factor analyses, with two correlated factors, indicate that

the two-factor model provides a stronger fit of the data to the students’ sample, in both elements

(GFI=.95; AGFI=.93; RMSEA= .06; Pop. Gamma Index=.96). As to the teachers’ sample, the

fit is not so good (GFI= .91; AGFI=.88; RMSEA=.06; Pop. Gamma Index=.95), which stresses

the fact that the concepts are more difficult to clarify for the faculty rather than for the students.


27

According to standards defined by Hair, Anderson, Tatham & Black (1987), and Long (1983),

the results indicate that the two-factor model provides a good fit of the data to the sample (GFI

and AGFI greater than .90; RMSEA between .05 and .08; and Pop. Gamma Index higher than

.95)

Differences Between Students and Teachers

Using both subscales (Task/Effectiveness and Relation/Creativity), various analyses of

variance were done. Both means, of teachers and students, in each element, were compared, and

the results are shown in Table 1.

Table 1. Mean differences in the element, As I think I am (I would be) as a teacher, between Teachers, Students, and Creative Teachers, in the Relation and Task Subscales.

Subjects

Subscale

N

M

SD

F

pa

Teachers Students Creative Teachers

Relation

854 245 23

2.72 2.24 2.32

.58 .55 .37

71.957

.000*

Teachers Students Creative Teachers

Task

854 245 23

1.99 2.16 1.91

.46 .56 .34

11.553

.000*

*

a Tukey’s Test for Unequal Samples * Teachers differ from Students at p<.000, and from Creative Teachers at p<.031 ** Teachers and Creative Teachers differ from Students at p<.001 As may be seen in the table, teachers and students differ in the way they see themselves

as teachers, when referring to creativity (relation) in teaching, thus supporting the first

proposition made [Students think they would be more creative as teachers than their actual

teachers think of themselves, in terms of creative teaching (relation oriented)].

Considering the task subscale as a criterion variable, and the results shown in Table 1, it

is possible to support the second proposition (Teachers perceive themselves more effective as

teachers, than students think they would be, if they were teachers).


28

Orientations towards creativity and effectiveness, among faculty, appeared to be of a mutually

exclusive nature, that is, an orientation to creative teaching was perceived as such at the expense

of effectiveness, and vice versa. This mutually exclusive tendency was not visible among

students.

The Teachers Considered as Creative

As described, 26 teachers interviewed filled in the questionnaire afterwards. As the

results shown in Table 1 demonstrate, differences between scores of creative teachers and normal

faculty support the third proposition. In fact, the teachers selected as examples of creative

teaching seem to have a position closer to students, as to creativity in teaching, and to that of

their colleagues, as to effectiveness.

This last finding supports the criterion validity of the instrument (accuracy of the test

scores in predicting actual performance), as it proves itself able to identify subjects who are

recognised as having a different attitude and behaviour. It also supports the conclusion that a

creative teacher does not have to make an option to identify his or her role with the teachers' or

students’ expectations only; the former are probably more directed to effectiveness in teaching,

while the latter prefer relationship. Thus a creative teacher seems to be just someone whose role

has a better clarification than the less creative teacher does.

Qualitative Analysis.

In an attempt to provide a picture of the match between the statements (taken out of the

interviews) of the teachers considered creative and their results in the questionnaire, a systematic

approach to their discourse was developed, by submitting the interviews to the statistical method

designated correspondence analysis, using SPAD-T (Lebart, Morineau, Becue & Haeusler,

1993) and Statistica software packages.


29

Hair, et al. (1995), define correspondence analysis as an interdependence technique that

facilitates dimensional reduction and conducts perceptual mapping, based on the association

between objects and a set of descriptive characteristics or attributes specified by the researcher.

According to these authors, the benefits of correspondence analysis lie in its unique abilities for

representing rows and columns (e.g., subjects and categories) in a joint space. This method is

normally used to match subjects and behaviours, or brands and attributes; in this case none of

them applied, as there was no intention to differentiate between subjects, considering their

discourse, but just to obtain a perceptual map of their own words and expressions, with the

categories used in this research.

The first type of categories, designated as research categories, were obtained by

submitting the interviews to successive simplifications of the wording used, and then factor

analysed by correspondence analysis, using SPAD-T software, to draw up the main categories,

used as columns. The interviews were also content analysed, and each unit of registry (words or

sentence with a specific meaning) was registered and grouped in a context category. Then, each

context unit was rated under as many research categories as it was related with (e.g., “I need

more time to do research”, relates to teacher, task, and creativity research categories; “I keep

myself distant from students”, relates to the teacher, relation, and student categories), and the

frequency of each context category, under each research category, was calculated, The first type

of categories were used as columns, and the second as rows in a final correspondence analysis,

using Statistica software package, in order to draw up the perceptual map of the discourse.

As may be seen in the chart (Figure 1), the teacher considered creative places himself or

herself in a central point of a space defined by two axes: the main one, horizontal (explaining

91% of the variance), with relation at one end (positive), and creativity at the other (negative);


30

the other axis, vertical (explaining 5% of the variance), with task at the positive end, and

creativity at the negative.

Row.Coords

Col.Coords

2D Plot of Row and Column Coordinates; Dimension: 1 x 2

Input Table (Rows x Columns): 6 x 5

Standardization: Row and column profiles

Dimension 1; Eigenvalue: ,22471 (91,83% of Inertia)

Dim

ensio

n 2

; E

igenvalu

e: ,0

1324 (

5,4

09%

of In

ert

ia)

Row1

Row2

Row3

Row4

Row5

Row6

TASK

RELATION

CREATIV

TEACHER

STUDENT

-0,25

-0,20

-0,15

-0,10

-0,05

0,00

0,05

0,10

0,15

0,20

0,25

0,30

-1,2 -1,0 -0,8 -0,6 -0,4 -0,2 0,0 0,2 0,4 0,6 0,8

Figure 1. Creative Teachers’ perceptual map: Projection of context (row) and research categories (column) in a two-axis space. Legend of rows: 1 = creation; 2 = job outside (the School); 3 = job inside (the School); 4 = different students (implications of); 5 = relationship; 6 = participation (of the students).

This distribution of space provides a clear picture of how the subjects see themselves in

the whole spectrum, in accordance with the findings reported in the previous section.

Figure 1 allow us to visualise how task and relation oppose each other in this perceptual

map, as happened with the quantitative analysis, in the previous section; while creativity

occupies a dominant position in half of the space defined by the two axes, revealing its

importance in the conception of the whole dimension of teaching.


31

Row.Coords

Col.Coords

2D Plot of Row and Column Coordinates; Dimension: 1 x 2

Input Table (Rows x Columns): 5 x 5

Standardization: Row and column profiles

Dimension 1; Eigenvalue: ,52475 (94,74% of Inertia)

Dim

ensio

n 2

; E

igenvalu

e:

,02825 (

5,1

01%

of

Inert

ia)

Row1Row2

Row3

Row4

Row5

TASK

RELATION

CREATIV

TEACHER STUDENT

-0,5

-0,4

-0,3

-0,2

-0,1

0,0

0,1

0,2

0,3

0,4

-1,0 -0,5 0,0 0,5 1,0 1,5 2,0

Figure 2. Less Creative Teacher’s perceptual map: Projection of context (row) and research categories (column) in a two-axis space. Legend of rows: 1 = creation; 2 = job outside (the School); 3 = job inside (the School); 4 = different students (implications of); 5 = relationship; 6 = participation (of the students).

Using the discourse of six less creative teachers, taken at random (see Figure 2), we may

see a perceptual map where task and teacher appear close together. Here, the teacher leaves the

central position, near the students and the relationship, and gets closer to a role where the

definition made by peers and superiors is more important.

Implicit Theories

The Creative Teacher’s Profile

From the interviews, and as described in Sousa (1999), it was possible to conclude that, at

the polytechnic, creative teachers:

Are “workaholics”, with a teaching experience of more than ten years, unique and different from each other in such a way that it is difficult to find patterns, but in the fact that all love what they do, and all of them love their students.


32

They do not recognize themselves as creative, and tend to attribute that assessment to external factors (e.g. nature of the subject matter taught, reputation as a professional outside the educational environment), or to the kind of relationship that they maintain with their students. They tend to see themselves as “good teachers” and “actors on stage”, or as “negotiators” with their students, frequently available outside class, flexible as to students” deviant behaviors (e.g. late arrivals), close (friendly) and distant (not a “comrade”) at the same time; knowing their names, participating in their initiatives and standing up for them when needed. Popular among students and respected (and probably envied) by their peers, they sometimes fear that being too nice can also be a bad thing for the students, preventing them from giving appropriate feedback, or leading them to fail later, when they will not have the extra support that they get from these teachers. They prefer not to go in for too detailed a preparation of their classes, leaving something to be constructed with the students, as a sort of “hazardous class adventure”, so that it may become a surprise to themselves, as well as to their students. They hardly repeat a class, exercise, or semester exactly in the same way. Good professionals in their own fields, they often carry out both activities (work and teaching) simultaneously, especially in the arts, accountancy and engineering fields, as this gives them the possibility of becoming experts in making analogies between academic and real life. Preferring to demystify science in its application to real-life problems, emphasizing communication instead of content, and alerting the students to everything that surrounds them, in their classes they try to create a climate favorable to the sharing of experiences. Some of them may be more “task-oriented”, corresponding to the “actor on stage”, or “seducer” type; others may be more “relationship-oriented”, corresponding to the “supportive” approach, aimed at establishing close relationships and providing social support. The former type may also be designated as “masculine”, or ‘transformational”; and the latter “feminine”, or “facilitating”. As to their ideal of perfection, they feel they are in equilibrium with their students, and that they must change as the students change, and all they wish is to have more time for themselves and for their students, and need less time to get to know them well. And last, but not least, they tend to be subject-matter experts, with a constant worry for keeping themselves up-to-date. (p 362)

Definitions of creative teaching were chosen as examples of implicit theories of creative

teaching:

The innovative, task-oriented teacher:


33

To be half way to being a good teacher A communicator first Someone who leaves his or her mark A seducer, who ‘inflames’, ’infects’, turns the students into subject matter ‘addicts

Others corresponded to the “facilitator” type of teacher:

Something that comes from the humility of creating our practice out of our self- assessment, presenting a model that does not have to be perfect (i.e. is not necessarily a role-model) and that must not try to impose itself Is to live between light and darkness; to have an idea and not to have the image of that idea To try to understand whether what each student takes out of school has to do with his or her wishes Being ethical (relationship), before being aesthetic (task) To be able to discover what the student has to say; what he or she is able to do; how his or her expressiveness reveals itself

Finally, the typical uncreative teacher seems to be:

Just someone who delivers the subject matter always the same way, not taking the students’ reactions into consideration; who leads them to concentrate on facts and concepts, instead of questioning themselves and the subject matter A predictable person

Conclusions

This study provided strong evidence to support a positive answer to the research problem

(“Do students and faculty perceive their own creativity and effectiveness in teaching in different

ways?”).

In fact, students and faculty of the Lisbon Polytechnic Institute seemed to concentrate on

different aspects of teaching and to provide different orientations as to what makes the core of

the activity: creativity, seen as the outcome of a successful communication between students and

teachers, where each player has the opportunity to express freely its own creativity; and

effectiveness, seen as the task aspects of teaching where the student does not play an active part,


34

or has just to respond to the teacher’s requirements, e.g. the teacher’s actions aimed at preparing,

organising and delivering the content materials, and evaluating the learning that has taken place.

Students seemed to concentrate more on the relationship aspects of teaching (creativity), while

imagining how they would be (real) as teachers, and how they would like to be (ideal), while the

opposite happened as to how effective they would be as teachers (real), and attributing less

importance to that effectiveness in the definition of the ideal.

This separation of conceptions of teaching, in accordance with the role performed, was

supported by another finding, related to the last proposition made (“Creative teachers will tend to

score close to students, in the way they value creativity in teaching, and close to faculty in

effectiveness”), where it became clear that the teachers who were selected as examples of

creative teaching did not differ from students, in their conceptions of creativity in teaching,

neither from their peers, in effectiveness. Even though they represented a small group, in

comparison with the whole sample of teachers, the differences were significant enough to

support the proposition, reinforcing the finding that creative teachers tend to have a better role

clarification than their less creative colleagues, and that they succeeded in balancing both factors

(creativity and effectiveness) in a more effective way than their colleagues do. In fact,

orientation towards creativity and effectiveness, among faculty, seemed to be of an exclusive

nature, that is, when a lecturer had an orientation to creativity in teaching, he or she seemed to do

that at the expense of effectiveness, and vice-versa. This tendency was not visible among

students, when imagining themselves as teachers.

The correspondence analysis made to the mentioned interviews allowed us to visualize

how task and relation aspects of teaching oppose each other in their perceptual map, as happened

with the quantitative analysis. The teacher, occupying a central position in the perceptual map


35

(Figure 1), reflected the results obtained in the questionnaire by the lecturers considered creative,

where they scored similarly to the students, as to the relationship aspect of teaching, and to their

peers, as to the task aspect. This configuration also revealed the way these lecturers separate

creativity from their relation with the students, but also from their task as teachers, considering it

as an opposing direction of each dimension. This does not mean, to them, that creativity opposes

teaching but rather that it is its main aspect. To them, creativity must be seen as an isolated

aspect of teaching, and as a kind of target, that neither the teacher nor the students should pursue

for its own sake: moving the teacher towards creativity might imply his or her separation from

the students and from teaching, while moving to the task would divert the teacher from

creativity, connecting him or her with the task aspect of teaching only.

This trend was confirmed by the analysis made to a similar discourse of a teacher not

selected as example of creative teaching, in which it was clear that although representing the

teaching universe in the same way as their more creative colleagues did, he placed himself not at

the center of that universe, but near the task aspects of teaching (their “official” role as teachers),

and away from his students.

From these findings it is possible to appreciate the general framework in which the

construction of the role may take place. They also make possible to develop a better

understanding of the teaching situation, especially when dealing with the extra effort that a

teacher has to make in the attempt to draw his or her role out of an ever changing student

population, instead of doing it from other teachers, only, or just from a school’s conception of

the student’s prototype. A teacher may consider other teachers as the “significant other”, and

“take their role” accordingly, or place the students in that position; if so, the effort of imagination

that has to be made is much stronger, in this latter case, due both to role distance and to the


36

diversity and changing character of the student population. As the bargaining that has to be done

between teacher and student, so that teaching actions become validated, is highly emotional, it is

possible that what happens during role making lies far beyond consciousness and rationality, and

mainly in the will and effort to maintain a constant update of the perception of the other’s

reactions to one’s actions, so that role support may be achieved.

The role making of a teacher, keeping the students as the “significant other”, and without

rejecting other teachers as role models, seems to be achieved, then, by just a small proportion of

professionals, and its perhaps this reality that will be possible to change, either by reviewing the

professional assumptions about a teacher’s role, or the present training systems that prepare

future professionals. Only by reducing the distance that separates teachers’ and students’

requirements for education will it be possible to increase the proportion of professionals who are

capable of balancing both types of requirements.

Another interesting finding was the possibility that there exists some kind of

identification between students and lecturers, and that the former tend to converge with the latter

in their preferences for creativity or effectiveness in teaching, as they progress in their courses.

This way, students seem to follow the teachers’ orientation, in a sort of role making conforming

to faculty’s preferences.

Besides the independent variable “Role”, which proved to be the best predictor of all

controlled variables, “School” also appeared as an important variable in defining differences

among the criterion variables used. In fact, the study presented evidence that different students

choose different Schools and courses, and that the students change their conceptions of teaching

over the years, in the direction of those of their teachers, as stated above. Even with some

exceptions, students seem to enter higher education with certain expectations about creativity


37

and effectiveness in teaching, which tend to become reduced as they progress, in such a way that

we may speak of a sort of “standardisation” factor, strong enough to appear in the results of a

simple measurement instrument such as the one used in this research.

As to the lecturers, only the variable “School” produced some variation in their

conceptions of creativity and of effectiveness in teaching. Nevertheless, it seems that it is not the

organisational environment, nor its correspondent scientific domain, which originates differences

among faculty, but a convergence of factors that cluster around the predictor “School”. For

example, the variable “Teaching Experience”, used as co-variate, did not reveal enough

statistically significant influence, but its visible tendency supported what may be one of the

reasons why the scores at the Media School appear higher than at the Teacher Training School.

In fact, the average teaching experience of faculty was shorter at the former (9 years), while at

the latter, faculty had the longest average teaching experience (19 years); also, while the nature

of that experience was connected to primary and secondary level teaching, at the Teacher

Training School, at the Media School the experience was more as a corporate professional. The

Teacher Training School had also the cumulative effect of “Gender” (more women as teachers)

and “Academic Qualifications” (higher proportion of M.A. and Ph.D.), as reasons to show more

proximity to the image of creative teaching.

This way, it is probably for personal reasons (age, experience, gender, qualifications), not

organisational (context or culture) ones (organisational environment, scientific domain), that

lecturers showed some differences in their own perceptions as teachers, when referring to the

creative teaching concept. As to effectiveness no differences were found.

The Art Schools did not reveal a defined pattern of perception different from the other

Schools. Even with comparatively reduced numbers of subjects, the analyses made provided


38

enough evidence to detect differences among their students, with the dance students favouring

creativity, and music students closer to effectiveness.

Final Comments

The opportunity to meet, interview, analyse the discourse, and attend the classes of such

interesting subjects as those selected as examples of creative teaching, provided the final touch to

this research: the possibility to understand people’s concepts of creativity and creative teaching,

as seen by those who are its living examples. Up to a point, these subjects provided the

necessary links between theory and reality, between scientific constructs and people’s concepts,

adding some more definitions and descriptions of creative teaching.

As to class observation it was not possible to detect patterns or to learn much from the

lecturers, given the experience of the observer with creative teaching techniques. It became clear

that none of these lecturers used any specific method or technique, nor a constant and thoughtful

approach to teaching and learning. Some, more than others, exhibited a personal style where

communication with the students seemed to be a constant worry, even though it was not always a

verbal interactive communication. If fact, many of them seemed to have made an option for the

lecture type of lesson, while using all possible skills to detect the students’ reactions to the talk,

in a sort of player-public rapport.

Through them it was possible to confirm that teaching creatively is seen by its agents as

the search for doing things better (effectiveness), within the framework of a professional role

definition, while keeping the students as the main target. And that if the communication process

is successful, that attempt is perceived by the students as novel and valuable, in helping them to

develop and to be ready to face new challenges. Both players - students and lecturers - tend to

attribute to each other the reasons why creative products result from their interaction.


39

That is why the teacher’s perspective of effectiveness transforms itself into creativity

when the student is considered as an active player, and as the raison d’être of the search for that

effectiveness. Creativity, though, lies not in the teacher, nor in the student, but in the interaction

between the two, therefore demonstrating the validity of Csikszentmihalyi’s conception that

creativity is located in neither the creator nor the creative product but rather in the interaction

between the creator and the field’s gatekeeper who selectively retains or rejects original

products. This research suggested that it seems more important to understand what is involved

in the construction of the role of teacher, and in the communication process with the students,

rather than exploring creative ways to present subject matter to students.

As to Paul Torrance’s (1995) observation, which opened this dissertation “Great teachers

will have to live with the fate of being fired, discredited, isolated or their funds being

withdrawn”, and to the questions that followed, we hope that this research can be used as a

contribution to changing that fate in the future. In fact, the creative teachers selected by the

students in this research, did not correspond to the image of eccentricity as, for example, the one

that Robin Williams plays in the film The Dead Poets’ Society. And even though the aspect of

organisational integration and acceptance was not fully analysed, it became clear that they fitted

in perfectly in the ways a higher education teacher is expected to “behave” by peers and

administration. They could eventually be envied by their peers, but not rejected because of

incompetence or lack of conformity to a teacher’s role.

If rejection may also occur because of the mechanisms underlying human envy, it will

become more difficult to use them effectively if creativity in teaching is demystified, recognised

and praised by the educational system, as this research tries to justify.


40

References

Alencar, E. (1994). Creativity in the Brazilian educational context: Two decades of research. Gifted and Talented International, 9, 4-7.

Amabile, T. (1983). The social psychology of creativity. New York: Springer-Verlag. Arnold, J. (1992). Useful creative techniques. In Sidney S. Parnes (Ed.) Source book for

creative problem solving. Buffalo, NY: Creative Education Foundation. Baer, J. (1993). Creativity and divergent thinking: A task specific approach. Hillsdale, New

Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Baer, J. (1997). Creative teachers, creative students. Boston, M. A.: Ally & Bacon. Barros, J., Neto, F., & Barros, A. (1992). Autopercepção de criatividade nos professores e

outras variáveis de personalidade [ Self- perception of creativity in teachers and other

personality variables]. Jornal de Psicologia, 10 (2), 9-14. Berger, P., Luckmann, T. (1976). The social construction of reality. Harmondsworth:

Penguin Books. Boone, G. M. (1987). Topoi and figures of speech: The place of creativity in rhetorical

studies. In D. G. Tuerck (Ed.), Creativity and liberal learning: Problems and

possibilities in American education. Norwood, N.J.: Ablex Publishing Corporation. Bozik, M. (1990). Teachers as creative decision makers. Action in Teacher Education, 12(1),

50-54. Craft, A. (1999). Educator perspectives on creativity: An English study. The Journal of

Creative Behavior, 32, 4, 244-257. Cropley, A. J. (1992). More ways than one: Fostering creativity. Norwood, N. J.: Ablex

Publishing Corporation. Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1991). Systems view of creativity. In R. S. Sternberg (Ed.). The

nature of creativity. Contemporary psychological perspectives. Cambridge, NY: Cambridge University Press.

Dawson, V. L., D’Andrea, T., Affinito, R., & Westby, E. L. (1999). Predicting creative

behavior: A re-examination of the divergence between traditional and teacher-defined concepts of creativity. Creativity Research Journal, 12, (1), 57-66.

Entwistle, N., & Marton, F. (1989). The psychology of student learning. European Journal

of Psychology of Education, 4, 4, 449-452.


41

Fryer, M. (1996). Management style and views about creativity. In H. Geshka, S. Moyer & T. Rickards (Eds.), Creativity & innovation: The power of synergy. Frankfurt, Germany: Geschka & Partner Untenehmens Heratung.

Fryer, M., Collings, J. (1990). Teachers’ views about creativity. British Journal of

Educational Psychology, 61, 207-219. Gabarro, J. (1987). The development of working relationships. In J. W. Lorsh (Ed.),

Handbook of organisational behavior: Vol.1 (pp. 172-190). NS: Simon & Schuster. Greenblat, C. S. (1988). Designing games and simulations: An illustrated handbook.

London: Sage. Isaksen, S., Parnes, S. (1992). Curriculum planning for creative thinking and problem

solving. In Sidney S. Parnes (Ed.). Source book for creative problem-solving. Buffalo, NY: Creative Education Foundation.

Hair, J. F., Anderson, R. E., Tatham, R. L., & Black, W. C. (1987). Multivariate data

analysis (4th Ed.). Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall. Harrin, A. (1993), Prior experience and initial teacher education. Journal of Further and

Higher Education, 17 (3), 40-48. Hinde, R. A. (1997). Relationships: A dialectical perspective. Hove, U. K.: Psychology

Press Publishers. Jesuino, J. C. (1987). Processos de liderança. Lisboa: Livros Horizonte. Lebart, L., Morineau, A., Becue, M. & Haeusler, L. (1993). Introduction à SPAD-T intégré:

Version 1.5 PC. Saint-Mandé: Centre International de Statistique et d’Informatique Appliquées.

Long, J. S. (1983). Confirmatory factor analysis. London: Sage. Kanter, R. M. (1983). The change masters. New York: Simon & Schuster. Kasof, J. (1995). Explaining creativity: The attributional perspective. Creativity Research

Journal, 8, 4, 311-365. Kaufman, G. (1993). The context and logical structure of creativity concepts. In S. C.

Isaksen, M. Murdock, R. Firestien & D. Treffinger (Eds.). Understanding and

recognizing creativity: The emergence of a discipline. Norwood, New Jersey: Ablex Publishing Corporation.

Kelly, G. (1963). A theory of personality: The theory of personal constructs. New York: Norton

& Company.


42

Kokot, S. J., & Colman, J. (1997). The creative mode of being. The Journal of Creative

Behavior, 31, 3, 212-226. Maslow, A. (1968). Toward a psychology of being (2nd Ed.). New York: Van Nostrand. Mayer, R. (1989). Cognitive views of creativity: creative teaching for creative learning.

Contemporary Educational Psychology, 14(3), 203-211. Munné, F. (1989). Entre el individuo y la sociedad: Marcos y teorias actuales sobre el

comportamiento interpersonal. Barcelona: Promociones y Publicaciones Universitárias, S. A.

Osborn, A. (1993). Applied imagination (3rd Revised Ed.). Buffalo, New York: Creative

Education Foundation. Petkus, E. (1966). The creative identity: Creative behavior from the symbolic interactionist

perspective. Journal of Creative Behavior, 30 (3), 188-196. Pfeiffer, J. W. & Jones, J. E. (Eds.) (1974), A handbook of structured experiences for human

relations training. San Diego: Pfeiffer & Company. Rogers, E. M. (1983) Diffusion of innovations (3rd edition) New York: The Free Press Runco, M. (1998). Book review. The Journal of Creative Behavior, 32, 2, 92-95. Sanford, J. A. (1998). Evil: The shadow side of reality. New York: The Crossroad

Publishing Company. Slabbert, J. A. (1994). Creativity and education revisited: Reflection in aid of progression.

Journal of Creative Behavior, 28, 61-69. Spector, B. (1983). An analysis of factors encouraging creative teachers to leave the

classroom. Paper presented at the University of South Florida College of Education. Tampa, Florida 33620.

Spence, W. R. (1994). Innovation: The communication of change in ideas, practices and

products. London: Chapman & Hall. Stein, M. I. (1953). Creativity and culture. The Journal of Psychology, 36, 311-322. Stein, M. I. (1984). Making the point. NY: Bearly limited. Stein, M. I. (1986), Gifted, talented and creative young people: A guide to theory, teaching

and research. New York: The Mews Press, Ltd.


43

Stein, M. I. (1994). Stimulating creativity (Vol. I). New York: Academic Press, Ltd. (Originally published in 1974, by Academic Press)

Stryker, S. & Statham, A. (1985), Symbolic interaction and role theory. In G. Lindsey and

E. Aronson (Eds.), The handbook of social psychology (3rd Ed.). New York: Random House.

Sousa, F. C. (1999). Creativity and effectiveness in teaching: Perceptions of students and

teachers of the Lisbon Polytechnic Institute. (Dissertacion de doctorado, non publicada) Lisboa: ISCTE (Disponible en la base de dados ERIC, refª Ed 446483).

Torrance, E. P. (1962). Guiding creative talent. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc. Torrance, E. P. (1968). Education and the creative potential. Minneapolis: The University

of Minnesota Press. Torrance, E. P. (1995). Why fly? A philosophy of creativity. Norwood: New Jersey. Ablex

Publishing Corporation. Torrance, E. P. (1997). Tests: Opinions on creative learning and teaching, and What makes a

college of education creative? Unpublished manuscripts. Torrance, E. P., Murdock, M. and Fletcher, D. C. (1996). Creative problem solving through

role playing. Georgia Studies of Creative Behavior, Athens, GA: Benedic Books. Torrance, E. P. & Safter, N. T. (1990). The incubation model of teaching: Getting beyond the

Aha!. Buffalo: Bearly Limited. Treffinger, D. (1980). Encouraging creative learning for the gifted and talented. Ventura,

CA: Ventura County Schools/LTI. Trow, M. (1997). The politics of motivation: A comparative perspective. In J. L. Best (Ed.).

Teaching well and liking it: Motivating faculty to teach effectively. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press.

Walberg, H. J. (1991). Creativity and talent as ways of creativity. In R. S. Sternberg (Ed.).

The nature of creativity. Contemporary psychological perspectives. Cambridge, NY: Cambridge University Press.

Whitman, N. (1983). Teaching problem solving and creativity in college courses. AAHB-

ERIC/Higher Education Research Currents, 2-7. West, M. A. & Farr, J. L. (Eds.) (1990). Innovation and creativity at work: Psychological

and organizational strategies. Chichester: Wiley & Sons.


44

Woodman, R. W., & Schoenfeldt, T. (1989). Individual differences in creativity: An interactionist perspective. In J.A. Glover, R.R. Ronning & C.R. Reynolds (Eds.). Handbook of Creativity (pp. 77-93). New York: Plenum Press.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.

Documents

Creative Teaching 41halaman